Page 120 of Auctioned Innocence
When we finally make it inside, both breathing hard, I look at her—fierce and brilliant and unstoppable—and the truth hits me like a physical blow.
I love her.
Not just want. Not just need. Not just the desperate passion we’ve been drowning in since that first night in Mario’s penthouse.
Love.
Pure. Terrifying. Absolute.
It’s not the adrenaline talking, or the relief of survival, or the way she moved through that firefight like avenging death incarnate. It’s the way she trusted me completely on that impossible jump. The way she compartmentalized her shock about Lorenzo to focus on keeping us alive. The way she looked at me when Alberto revealed the connection to my father—not with pity, but with understanding.
She’s not just Marco’s little sister anymore. She’s not just the girl I was supposed to protect. She’s my partner. My equal. The other half of something I never knew I was missing.
And I’m terrified of losing her.
“Dante?” She touches my face, concern evident on her beautiful face. Blood streaks her temple from where debris caught her during our escape. “Are you hit?”
Instead of answering, I pull her close, kissing her hard. Desperate. Like she might disappear if I don’t hold tight enough. She tastes like gunpowder and determination and everything I’ve ever wanted.
“I love you,” I breathe against her mouth, the words torn from somewhere deep. “God help me, Sofia, I love you.”
Her smile breaks through the darkness like sunrise. “About time you admitted it.”
“I mean it,” I say fiercely, needing her to understand. “This isn’t just about tonight, or the danger, or?—”
“I know.” She cups my face in her hands, thumbs brushing across my cheekbones. “I love you too, Dante. Have for longer than I should probably admit.”
“How long?” The question slips out before I can stop it.
“Since I was nineteen and you walked away from me in the library.” Her laugh is soft, a little sad. “Maybe before that. Hard to tell when hero worship becomes something else.”
The admission hits me like a punch to the solar plexus. All those years I spent fighting my feelings, thinking I was protecting her, she was?—
A bullet shatters our back window.
“Drive,” she orders, already returning fire. “We need to warn Marco about Lorenzo.”
I floor it, heart full of love and rage and purpose.
Lorenzo wants war?
We’ll give him war.
24
SOFIA
Uncle Lorenzo. The man who taught me to ride a bike. Who helped me with my math homework. Who brought me soup when I was sick.
Who tried to have me sold to the highest bidder.
I stare at the evidence spread across the makeshift bed Mario set up—just a mattress on the warehouse floor, but it serves our needs. The files, security logs, money trails. All leading back to the man I trusted like a second father. My hands shake as I pick up each piece of damning evidence, reading it again and again as if the words might somehow change.
Almost four decades of lies. Of manipulation. Of positioning himself to destroy everything I love.
“I should have seen it,” I say quietly, my voice hollow with self-loathing. Dante stills in the doorway where he’s been watching me unravel. “All the signs were there and I missed them.”
His silence speaks volumes. He knows. He knows I’m falling apart.
